I wanted to share a little bit of the process of creating my first crystal cluster, which is now featured in my shop. It's one of my favorite new pieces and I hope you love it as much as I do!

It started alllllllllll the way back with my Tessellation Series. Found vintage images showing people and their homes are scanned, digitally manipulated, printed out, and then physically sculpted. The Gems and Crystal Clusters use the same basic material as my larger Tessellation Sculptures but sculpted to create something much smaller and more complex. I love the idea that this found material that celebrates unknown homes and history can be used to create something precious and valuable.

This piece started with a rough paper mock-up which is translated into a digital fold guide in Adobe Illustrator. Several more mock-ups are made with plain paper and the fold guide, each more refined, until I have a solid sense of how it will all come together. The printed photographs I use do not react well to over-handling, so it's best to do as much work as I can on plain paper before moving onto the printed photos so I can touch them as little as possible. Once everything is figured out, we get to the point in a project that I love, where all the decisions have been made, and all I have to do is sit down and make it happen!

This is first in the cluster series. And along with the Gems I've been making, I think I'll be making a couple more. I love working in multiples so you can expect a couple more pieces along these lines. They'll be added to the shop as they're completed. To see more images of this new crystal cluster, check out the Gem project page.